


Anxiety

by Stormvoël (BushRat8)



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: Anxiety, Barbossa comes home, F/M, Unexpected Worry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-02
Updated: 2019-07-02
Packaged: 2020-06-02 19:03:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19447645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BushRat8/pseuds/Stormvo%C3%ABl
Summary: Sophie is so absorbed in her household accounts that she doesn't notice when Barbossa arrives.  His reaction surprises her.





	Anxiety

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place after _Lean On Me_ , a chapter in Barbossa's life when he was deathly ill. Awareness of his own mortality has always been part of his existence, but that particular episode really hammered home how easily he could lose not just his own life, but also that of the one person he most treasures.
> 
> True to her promise to him, Sophie has closed Grantham House to paying lodgers. It is now a private home for herself and Barbossa, although she's retained the services of Cora as both housemaid and companion so she won't be alone when he's gone, and because it's a big house and she needs help in its upkeep.
> 
> Barbossa gave her his snake pendant to wear as a reminder of him when he's gone, with the proviso that she give it back when he returns.

-oOo-

Sophie is at the far back of the house, huddled at a table making entries in her household record, and she doesn't hear the greeting called from the door.  
  
"Dove? Darlin', I'm home!" Hanging up his hat, Barbossa sticks his head in the kitchen, checks the storeroom, and peers out back to see if she's doing the wash; goes upstairs to find out if she might, however unlikely it is, be taking a nap, but she seems to have vanished. "Dove?! Where are ye?"  
  
Cora's not around to ask, either, having been sent into town for a sack of rice, and Barbossa begins to worry. "Sophie?" he hollers, and a tinge of fear starts him to sweating. "Sophie! Sophia, answer me!"   
  
"Hector?"  
  
He whirls around to find a wide-eyed Sophie standing there. "For God's-fuckin'-sake, girl, where ye been? Did ye not hear me?"  
  
She moves into his arms to find him trembling. "No. I didn't; I'm sorry."  
  
"Ye should be!" But there's no rancor in his voice, only relief, and he hugs her tighter.  
  
Strangely — he's been away for nearly four months — Barbossa makes no move to whisk Sophie straight off to bed, and the touch of his hands speaks, not of lust, but of a desperate wish to reassure himself of her presence. _What's wrong?_ she wonders, although she knows better than to voice such a concern when he's only just arrived; and, in any case, it would be quite a feat to talk when his lips are on hers.  
  
"Hector?" she whispers once he lets her go. "Don't worry, my love; I'm here, and I'm so glad you're home."  
  
He's dog-tired and grimy, his hair falling in greasy strands about his face, but to Sophie, he couldn't be more beautiful as he confesses, "When ye didn't answer m' call, I were afeared I might find ye gone."  
  
It's a shock, to hear him speak like that, and Sophie wraps her arms around his neck. "I'd never leave you, Hector, and I've been right here waiting for you to come home, just as I promised."  
  
"Promised," Barbossa echoes in a shaky exhale. "Promised: aye, ye did." A last warm embrace; then he finally smiles and pinches her cheek, taking his ruby snake pendant from around her neck and fastening it about his own. "So, what were ye doin' that yer attention were so diverted?"  
  
"Just balancing the household accounts."  
  
He lifts a shaggy eyebrow at her as the corner of his mouth quirks up in a puzzled grin. "Don't know why ye bother, Dove; ye've coin enough t' spend on whate'er ye want, an' more put away b'sides. I daresay ye might be th' richest woman in town."  
  
"The habit of years, I suppose." Sophie's fingers play over the buttons of Barbossa's waistcoat, slipping them open, and she plants a kiss on his throat. "Shall I draw you a bath, then? Hot water will feel good on your back and your leg."  
  
"Hot water'll feel good on ev'ry inch of me, darlin', but you'd feel even better."  
  
"Bath first."  
  
Barbossa laughs. "Ye tellin' me I'm grubby, girl?"  
  
They've long been comfortable enough with each other that Sophie will more-or-less tell him the truth. "You're hardly the cleanest you've ever been."  
  
That's naught but a fact, and Barbossa shrugs. "Well, I s'pose I can't blame m' Dove for not wantin' t' get her feathers mucked up a-rollin' 'round wi' me just yet," he teases.  
  
"Go take a nap in the hammock out back," Sophie laughs back. "I'll call you when it's ready."

  
  
-oOo-  
-oOo-

After refreshing himself with a tankard of ale, and while Sophie's hauling and heating the water for his bath, Barbossa takes off his coat, then retires to the garden. He climbs into the hammock slung between two palm trees, putting his hat over his face to make it easier to rest, and tries to sleep.  
  
But he can't, because he's still disturbed by Sophie's failing to hear and answer his greeting. He understands how it happened, of course, but it brought on an unexpected rush of emotions: a sudden premonition of loss and grief; the fear that one day he could return to Grantham House and find it deserted. _I'll lose her_ , he thinks uneasily. _Anythin' could happen — an accident, or she'll take sick — an' she won't be here. What then?_  
  
It's finally occurring to Barbossa how very much he counts on Sophie; how much he needs her; how important she is in his life. He always knew it, really, but now…  
  
"Sophia!" he shouts, rolling out of the hammock. "Dove, are ye there?"  
  
She leans out the bedroom window and smiles down at him. "Almost done. Just a bit more hot water…"  
  
Barbossa races in the back door and up the stairs, stopping only to look in on the kettle and deciding it needs a minute or two more on the fire. "Ne'er mind th' water; cold'll do fine," he says, stripping off his clothes and climbing into the bathing tub — a new one he hasn't seen before, of shining copper and bigger than the last, the better to accommodate his long, lanky body — finding it tepid but comfortable even so.  
  
Sophie watches him slide down to submerge his head for a moment, knowing it's a signal that he wants her to scrub his dirty hair, but she's too worried about how he's acting to automatically get to it. She's seen him fret before, but not like this; not like his whole world is about to collapse. "Talk to me, Hector," she says softly as, after a brief hesitation, she starts to unplait and comb out his wet locks. "You're acting so very strangely, but how will I know why if you won't…"  
  
Barbossa catches the front of her bodice and pulls, ignoring the pins he dislodges that scrape along the back of his hand, and kisses her, hard. "I been gone too long, Dove," he whispers, "an' each time, I wonder if ye'll still be here for me when I return…"  
  
She swallows. "Do you know me so little as all that?"  
  
He thinks for a moment, twirling a loose wisp of her hair between his thumb and forefinger as he considers her words. "Sophia," he whispers. "Darlin', I've lost mother an' sisters, me Da, an' ev'ryone else I e'er…" — he tries to say _the word_ , but can't — "… that I e'er cared for," is the closest he can come. "I couldn't bear losin' you, too."  
  
_Where did that come from?!_ "You won't." Sophie dips her hand in the water, bringing it up again and again over Barbossa's shoulders to soothe him, then kisses his cheek. "Haven't I always been here for you? I…" She licks her lips and hopes, as she always does, that he won't find her demanding or clingy for what she's about to say. "I love you so much, Hector, and always have; why else do you think I waited all those years for you to come home? Do you think I'd not wait for you now?"  
  
_'Tisn't that, 'tisn't that_ , he thinks. _I know ye would, but… but what if somethin' else takes ye away? Some ailment, some disaster…?_  
  
Sophie feels how upset he is, but doesn't know how to help, save to stroke her hands over his back and nuzzle his neck. "I'm glad you're home, so glad you're home," she murmurs, again and again. "Now come: I think you could do with a good feed before anything else."  
  
After supper and retiring for the evening, Barbossa's lovemaking, delicious though it is, holds an aura of desperation that distresses Sophie, who does everything she can to make him feel safe and protected. _That's odd_ , she thinks to herself as she twines her fingers into his. _It's always been the other way around_. "Stop worrying," she tells him gently. "I've always been here for you, and I always will be." She kisses his cheek; the tip of his nose; caresses his now-clean, if sweaty, hair. "Tell me you know that. Tell me."  
  
"Aye, Dove, I know. I know…"  
  
The night is quiet, with no ringing bells summoning the innkeeper to her receiving desk; no demands from lodgers wanting this or that or the other; not even the presence of Cora, who has been sent to stay with her sister while Barbossa is there. Sophie and Hector are all alone in Grantham House: _their_ house.   
  
Their home.  
  
  
  
  
-oOo-  
-oOo-

At dawn, when he wakes to find Sophie still lying in the bed beside him, Barbossa feels very much better and more settled. "Oi," he whispers. "Are ye awake then, darlin'?"  
  
"I am now." She shifts, her arm sliding around his waist, her cheek pressed to his shoulder. "You want something to drink? Tea? Ale?"  
  
A cup of hot tea sounds good, and he says so. Sophie tells Barbossa he might remain in bed and she'll bring it to him, but he gets up and follows her down the stairs, bare naked. He can do that now, because this is his home, with no one but his blushing lady there to see him as he stretches this way and that, then pads about the parlour.  
  
He can hear Sophie rattling about in the kitchen laying a fresh fire, then goes in to find her kneeling in her chemise, trying to spark the damp kindling. "I shouldn't have let it go out," she grumbles.  
  
Barbossa takes the flint from her and, careful to shield his male bits from the sparks, gets the fire going. "Bit of ale'd do me well for now," he tells her. "I'll have th' tea later."  
  
Ale for him, lemon water for her, the couple retire to the parlour and settle comfortably on the settee, Barbossa draped over Sophie's lap, one arm dangling so he can run his fingers up and down her calf. "It still seems strange not to be cooking breakfast for lodgers," Sophie muses. "I'm so used to being a landlady that I'm not sure how to be… whatever it is I am."  
  
"Th' lady of th' house," says Barbossa, sitting up. "Ye've always been that, Dove. _My_ lady of th' house."  
  
They don't talk much after that, but enjoy each other's companionable silence as they consume their cool drinks and, after awhile, their tea. It will perhaps take a bit of getting used to, this new situation, but Barbossa realizes now what disturbed him so much: for years he was used to the noise and clatter and bustle of lodgers upon every return to Grantham House; to finding Sophie hard at work, with an exacting schedule to keep. He came home this time to quiet, but now he understands that it's a good quiet; that Sophie's no longer required to rush around serving others. These days, and for all the days to come, her life will revolve around him; and, if he comes home to discover her hidden away, working quietly in one room or another, there will be no matter; she'll come out the instant she knows he's there.   
  
For Barbossa, Sophie's old life is gone and she's no longer an innkeeper. She's his Dove, his own loving lady, his spouse in fact if not by law, waiting faithfully at home for his return so she might make his time ashore as comfortable and pleasant as she possibly can.

  
  
  
-oOo- FIN -oOo- 


End file.
